ionosctl

ionosctl

The command-line interface for IONOS Cloud. Create and manage cloud resources -- virtual machines, networks, storage, databases, Kubernetes clusters, DNS, and more -- directly from your terminal.

Ionosctl usage overview

Prerequisites: You need an IONOS Cloud account to use ionosctl.

Table of Contents

• Quick Start
• Installation
• Authentication
• Usage
  • Interactive Shell
  • Output Formats
  • Filtering & Querying
  • Waiting for Resources
  • Scripting & Automation
  • Getting Help
  • Global Flags
• Shell Auto-Completion
• Configuration
• Environment Variables
• Advanced Configuration
• Documentation
• Uninstalling
• Contributing

Quick Start

# 1. Install (macOS example -- see Installation for all platforms)
brew tap ionos-cloud/homebrew-ionos-cloud && brew install ionosctl

# 2. Authenticate
ionosctl login

# 3. Verify your identity
ionosctl cfg whoami

# 4. Run your first command
ionosctl datacenter list

# 5. Explore available commands
ionosctl --help

Installation

macOS (Homebrew)

brew tap ionos-cloud/homebrew-ionos-cloud
brew install ionosctl

Linux (Snap)

snap install ionosctl

Windows (Scoop)

scoop bucket add ionos-cloud https://github.com/ionos-cloud/scoop-bucket.git
scoop install ionos-cloud/ionosctl

Binary Download

Download the archive for your OS and architecture from the Releases page, or use:

# Download and extract (replace <version> with the full semantic version)
curl -sL https://github.com/ionos-cloud/ionosctl/releases/download/v<version>/ionosctl-<version>-linux-amd64.tar.gz | tar -xzv

# Move to a directory in your PATH
sudo mv ionosctl /usr/local/bin/

# Verify
ionosctl version

Building from Source

Requires Go (see go.mod for minimum version).

git clone https://github.com/ionos-cloud/ionosctl.git
cd ionosctl
make build    # or: make install

Dependencies are managed with Go Modules and vendored.

Note: The development version may contain unreleased changes. For production use, prefer official releases.

Authentication

ionosctl supports multiple authentication methods. Environment variables take priority over the config file.

Token Authentication

Token-based authentication is the recommended approach, especially for accounts with two-factor authentication (2FA) enabled:

# Via environment variable
export IONOS_TOKEN="your-bearer-token"

# Or via login command (persists to config file)
ionosctl login --token "$IONOS_TOKEN"

You can create tokens via the DCD or the CLI (ionosctl token create).

Username & Password

For accounts without 2FA, username/password authentication is also supported:

# Interactive login (prompts securely for credentials)
ionosctl login

# Or via environment variables
export IONOS_USERNAME="your-email@example.com"
export IONOS_PASSWORD="your-password"

Verifying Your Identity

Use whoami to check who you're logged in as, and --provenance to debug the authentication source:

ionosctl cfg whoami
ionosctl cfg whoami --provenance

Usage

Command Structure

ionosctl [service] [resource] [command] [flags]

Examples:

# List all data centers
ionosctl datacenter list

# Create a server in a data center
ionosctl server create --datacenter-id <dc-id> --name "web-server" --cores 2 --ram 4096

# Get a specific resource as JSON
ionosctl server get --datacenter-id <dc-id> --server-id <server-id> --output json

# Delete with auto-confirm (useful for scripts)
ionosctl server delete --datacenter-id <dc-id> --server-id <server-id> --force

# List Kubernetes clusters
ionosctl k8s cluster list

# Create a DNS zone
ionosctl dns zone create --name example.com

# List PostgreSQL clusters
ionosctl dbaas postgres cluster list

Interactive Shell

ionosctl includes a built-in interactive shell with auto-completion, command history, and inline suggestions -- ideal for exploration and ad-hoc management:

ionosctl shell

Inside the shell, you get:

• Real-time auto-completion for commands, subcommands, and flags
• Keyboard shortcuts (Ctrl+A/E for line start/end, Ctrl+P/N for history, Ctrl+W to cut word, etc.)
• Persistent flag values between commands with --persist-flag-values

Note: The interactive shell is a BETA feature. Destructive commands (e.g., delete) require the --force flag instead of interactive confirmation.

Output Formats

Control how results are displayed with --output (-o):

# Default table output
ionosctl datacenter list
# DatacenterId                          Name         Location
# 12345678-abcd-1234-abcd-123456789012  production   de/fra

# JSON output
ionosctl datacenter list --output json
# [{"id": "12345678-...", "properties": {"name": "production", ...}}]

# Select specific columns
ionosctl datacenter list --cols "DatacenterId,Name,Location"

# Hide column headers (useful for scripting)
ionosctl datacenter list --no-headers

# Quiet mode -- suppress all output except errors
ionosctl server delete --datacenter-id <id> --server-id <id> --force --quiet

Filtering & Querying

# Server-side filtering on list commands
ionosctl datacenter list --filters "name=production"
ionosctl server list --datacenter-id <id> --filters "vmState=RUNNING,cores=4"

# Order results
ionosctl datacenter list --order-by name

# Pagination
ionosctl server list --datacenter-id <id> --limit 10 --offset 20

# JMESPath query for advanced output filtering
ionosctl datacenter list --output json --query "[?properties.location=='de/fra']"

# Control API response depth
ionosctl datacenter get --datacenter-id <id> --depth 3

Waiting for Resources

Many create/update/delete operations return immediately while the resource is being provisioned. ionosctl commands that modify resources typically support a --wait-for-request (-w) flag to block until the operation completes:

# Wait for server to be fully provisioned
ionosctl server create --datacenter-id <id> --name "my-server" --cores 2 --ram 4096 --wait-for-request

# Wait for deletion to complete
ionosctl server delete --datacenter-id <id> --server-id <id> --force --wait-for-request

Scripting & Automation

ionosctl is designed to work well in scripts and CI/CD pipelines:

# Use JSON output + jq for programmatic access
DC_ID=$(ionosctl datacenter list --output json | jq -r '.[0].id')

# Combine --force and --wait-for-request for unattended operations
ionosctl server delete --datacenter-id "$DC_ID" --server-id "$SRV_ID" --force --wait-for-request

# Use --quiet to suppress output in scripts (only errors go to stderr)
ionosctl volume create --datacenter-id "$DC_ID" --name "data" --size 50 --quiet --wait-for-request

# Delete all servers in a datacenter
ionosctl server delete --datacenter-id "$DC_ID" --all --force

# Use --no-headers and --cols for clean parseable output
ionosctl server list --datacenter-id "$DC_ID" --cols ServerId --no-headers

Getting Help

# Top-level help
ionosctl --help

# Help for a specific command
ionosctl server create --help

# Help for a service group
ionosctl dbaas --help

# Nested help
ionosctl k8s cluster --help

Global Flags

These flags are available on all (or most) commands:

Shell Auto-Completion

ionosctl supports auto-completion for Bash, Zsh, Fish, and PowerShell. Completions include commands, subcommands, flags, and even flag values (like available data center IDs).

Bash

# Current session
source <(ionosctl completion bash)

# Permanent (add to ~/.bashrc)
echo 'source <(ionosctl completion bash)' >> ~/.bashrc

Zsh

# Setup (add to ~/.zshrc BEFORE compinit)
mkdir -p ~/.config/ionosctl/completion/zsh
ionosctl completion zsh > ~/.config/ionosctl/completion/zsh/_ionosctl

Add to ~/.zshrc:

fpath+=(~/.config/ionosctl/completion/zsh)
autoload -Uz compinit; compinit

Fish

ionosctl completion fish > ~/.config/fish/completions/ionosctl.fish

PowerShell

# Current session
ionosctl completion powershell | Out-String | Invoke-Expression

# Permanent (add to your PowerShell profile)
ionosctl completion powershell > ionosctl.ps1
# Then source it from your $PROFILE

Tip: Use --no-descriptions to disable completion descriptions if your shell feels too cluttered.

Configuration

ionosctl login generates a YAML config file that stores your token and per-product API endpoint URLs (auto-discovered from the IONOS Cloud API index). Default location:

ionosctl cfg location      # Print config file path
ionosctl cfg whoami        # Show current identity and auth source
ionosctl cfg logout        # Clear credentials (keeps endpoint URLs)
ionosctl login --example   # Preview the generated YAML without writing it

You can use --config /path/to/config.yaml to point to a different config file, and --profile-name / --environment during login to set up multiple profiles.

Authentication priority: env IONOS_TOKEN > env IONOS_USERNAME/IONOS_PASSWORD > config file token > config file username/password. Use ionosctl cfg whoami --provenance to see which source is active.

API URL priority: --api-url flag > IONOS_API_URL env var > per-product endpoint in config file > built-in default. This lets the config file hold per-product overrides (e.g., for staging) while flags and env vars can override on the fly.

Environment Variables

Warning: Set IONOS_LOG_LEVEL=Trace only for debugging. It logs full request/response payloads including sensitive data, and can significantly impact performance.

Advanced Configuration

Certificate Pinning

Bypass standard certificate validation by pinning a specific SHA-256 fingerprint (useful for self-signed certificates):

export IONOS_PINNED_CERT="<sha256-public-fingerprint>"

You can obtain the SHA-256 fingerprint from your browser's certificate inspector.

Man Pages (Linux)

Generate man pages for offline reference:

ionosctl man --target-dir /tmp/ionosctl-man
# Then copy to your man path and run: sudo mandb

Checking for Updates

ionosctl version --updates

Documentation

Uninstalling

# Homebrew (macOS)
brew uninstall ionosctl

# Snap (Linux)
snap remove ionosctl

# Scoop (Windows)
scoop uninstall ionosctl

# Manual install
sudo rm /usr/local/bin/ionosctl

# Local build
make clean

Contributing

Bugs & feature requests: Open an issue

Pull requests are welcome! Fork the repository, make your changes, and submit a PR. We'll review it and work together to get it released.

Running Tests

make test